Germany’s Policy Toward Al-Aqsa Flood: An Attempt to Understand
Germany, considered the central power of the European Union, ranks fifth in the world in terms of GDP (PPPindex), and first in Europe (which produces 29.9% domestically of the EU GDP), it is also the largest in the EU population (approximately 85 million people). It leads the European countries in the number of MEPs that influence European politics (96 members out of 720, which equals 13.3%).
Therefore, this means that Germany’s stance on the Al-Aqsa flood represents a significant variable of the international scene, this stance had a large bias in favor of Israel to the extent that only 9% of the Arab community continues to perceive Germany positively according to Arab public opinion polls. The main dimensions of this biasare represented by the following stances:
1. The constant condemnation of the Palestinian resistance and insisting on considering it a “terrorist movement.”
2. Considering all Israeli operations as legitimate self-defense, German Chancellor Olaf Schultz said, “We have no place but alongside Israel.”
3. Germany is the second-largest arms supplier to Israel after the United States, accounting for 47% of Israel’s arms purchases, according to a professional report by SIPRI. Although many countries known for their relations with Israel find it awkward to sell arms to Israel after the Al-Aqsa flood, the German chancellor, Schultz, went beyond all this embarrassment.
4. Germany’s criticism of the decisions of theinternational judicial entities (the International Courtof Justice (ICJ) and the International Criminal Court(ICC)) which led Nicaragua to sue Germany beforethe ICJ for “aiding Israel in its genocidal policy against Gaza” by arming and defending its policies.
5. Restricting the activities of supporting the Palestinian resistance or even demanding Israel’s condemnation, was shown in the universities, public protests, and seminars. In addition to punishing German intellectuals who did not support the official positionin its stances against the Palestinians.
6. Enforcing the Anti-Semitism or Incitement to Hatred Act, (specifically against Israel), which mandates a five-year prison sentence.
7. Germany’s interpretation of the two-state solution does not go beyond the concept of the Zionist leftwing.
Remarkably, German government policy, especially the declared “haughtiness and apathy” stances of its chancellor, Schultz, are incompatible with the stances of the German people regarding the Israeli practices in Gaza, specifically after the Israeli invasion of Gaza after the Al-Aqsa flood, a survey by the Forsa Research Institute (A German Institute)at the end of May 2024 found the following results:
• 61% of Germans opposed the Israeli attack on Gaza while 33% supported it.
• 57% demanding the German government to condemn Israeli behavior.
• 69% consider the Israeli attack on Gaza as “illegal”.
• 87% demanding more Western pressure on Israel.
• 48% of Germans question the neutrality of Western media reporting on what is happening in Gaza (another German survey).
Everything mentioned above imposes a specific question, why is this German stance that strays from the European general trend of less recklessness even in voting in the United Nations? It could be said that the reasons for Germany’s stance revolve around two dimensions: historical Dimension and current dimension as follows:
First, the historical dimension
The “Holocaust” and Nazi crimes gave an area to justify the constant aid from Germany to Israel, and the embarrassment of criticizing Israel’s policies has become a prevailing tradition since the end of World War II. In addition, the historical relationship between Israel and Germany had strengthened as a reaction to the Nasserismtrends in the sixties of the last century. Not to mention the development of the fabric of relations through the structural relationship forged by Shimon Peres and the German Minister of Defense Strauss in the sixties, and to promote the renewal of this approach, the German government has taken two approaches in this direction:
• The constant payments of financial compensation to those considered victims of Nazism since 1945. To date, Germany is still paying these compensations tosome Jews particularly in Israel, so far, the payment has reached about 87 billion dollars, and most recently in 2023 a payment worth about 1.5 billion euros.
In this situation, Germany continues to hold on to its stanceon Israel in order not to raise historical allegations against it, but why does Germany not pay compensation to 27 million Soviet individuals for instance, including 19 million civilians killed by the Hitler Army? Why are those compensations limited only to the Jews?
• Enforcing the anti-Semitism law by the Schultz government since 2021, they even expanded the anti-Semitism law, providing the legal cover to suppress all support for Palestine.
Second, the current dimension
The German “obstinacy” of the constant absolute support of Israel currently and after the flood can be seen as follows:
1. The role of the Jewish lobby: Although the number of Jews in Germany does not exceed 150 to 200 thousand, most of whom emigrated to Germany from the Soviet Union after its collapse, and more than 65%of them are concentrated in Berlin, however, severalcivil society organizations working for Israel greatly influence the tendencies of figures of the German government, perhaps two of which are the most prominent, (The values Initiative) and what so-called(the Middle East Peace Forum) or the NAFFO Group. Earlier in 2019, the central council of Jews in Germany had launched a sharp attack on the well-known German magazine “Der Spiegel” after it revealed in its report that “Bribes were given by the Jewish lobby to members of the German parliament to block a resolution to impose a boycott on Israel”.According to the magazine, the bribes led to anopposite decision, imposing restrictions on the Boycott Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) group, which is known to be anti-Semitic as it supports Palestinian rights, hence the magazine responded by confirming its accusations against the Jewish lobby. The influence of this lobby was evident in the reaction to the statements of one of the most prominent German experts in American politics, Josef Bramlbecause he accused the Jewish lobby of being an affective variable in Western politics, especially theAmerican.
2. The weight of the Anglican Christian stream in German decision-making entities: It is necessary to recognize that the political distance between Judaism and Protestantism is shorter than the distance with Catholicism, whereas about 50% of the German society belongs to Protestantism where Anglican wingbelongs to it and considers that “the assembly of Jews in the promised land is the sign of the christ’s return”, and that the Bible is the completion of the Old Testament (Torah), as exemplified in the current Zionist Christianity, it is natural that a sharp negative view of Muslims and Arabs prevails, especially since the Government’s agreement with the Green and Christian Democratic Parties that was based on support for Israel as one of the standpoints of the current German Government, which explains that in areas where German Muslims live, the ruling Social Democratic Party (SPD) received low approval ratios.
3. German unions play a balanced role in shaping the directions of German parties and politics, and the Social Democratic Party is almost one of the most german parties that relies on the role of unions in its electoral support, and the strength of the unions is cantered in the industrial parks, specifically the military industries. As indicated before, since Germany is the second largest arms supplier to Israel after the United States, the profits of arms sales these unions make bring them closer to Israel’s stance and drag with them the Social Democratic Party that relies on them. It is very noticeable that German arms sales to Israel have nearly doubled tenfold over the previous two years.
4. European socialist parties generally predominate in a biased stance in favor of Israel, and since the “Zionist Left” shaped through international socialist institutions the relationship with these parties (Perez had a very important role in this regard), The Relations between the European socialist powers and Israel were strengthened (For example, The tripartite aggression against Egypt occurred in the time ofthe socialism in France, then Israel obtained its nuclear program in the time of socialism the year after the aggression… etc.). In 1970, Philly Brandt knelt in front of the Nazi monument and his anti-Vietnam emancipation stance was a sign of the party’s trends, the end of this party’s rapprochement with the United States was to allow the deployment of the American missiles in Germany starting from 2026.
5. Germany ranks third globally in the list of trade partners of Israel, the volume of trade between them reached approximately $9.1 billion, equivalent to 7.57% of Israel’s total trade.
6. The absence of any diplomatic role for the Arabs in influencing German policy, even though the volume of Arab-German trade amounts to 67.5 billion dollars (almost seven times the trade with Israel), and there are more than 110 billion dollars of Arab investment in Germany, however, Arab-German trade is mostly with Arab countries that oppose the axis of resistance, consequently, encourages Germany to go far in support of Israel without any political concerns fromany Arab reaction.
In conclusion, Germany’s bias toward Israel is not a “coincidence” but rather the result of a purely pragmatic social, political, and economic structure.